As a throng of expatriate voters from Venezuela belted out the country's national anthem near him Sunday, Daniel Griffith gazed at them and smiled. "Let's scream out loud: Death to oppression!" they sang in part. "Faithful compatriots, your strength is in your unity."

Griffith remarked, "If you listen to the words, that's what we are doing here today."

Griffith, 27, took a 14-hour bus ride from Miami to New Orleans with his cousin and mother and cast his expatriate ballot for Venezuela's presidential election at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. To vote, thousands like Griffith were forced to figure out a way to get to New Orleans and wait in a line in front of the convention center that stretched several downtown blocks, from Julia to Calliope streets. Throughout the day, new voters would join that line upon disembarking from buses and other vehicles.

The vast majority of them were expected to support candidate Henrique Capriles Radonski, the opponent to Venezuela's incumbent socialist president, Hugo Chavez. Capriles supporters say Chavez has failed to solve persistent problems such as a staggering murder rate, periodic electricity blackouts and poorly-equipped hospitals. Chavez's camp counters that he has supported social programs benefiting the poor with Venezuela's oil wealth.

Usually, for Venezuelan elections, the country's consulate in Miami serves 20,000 expat voters living in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina, by far the largest concentration of Venezuelans outside the home country. But Venezuela shut down the Miami consulate in January, after State Department officials expelled the consul, who was suspected of participating in an Iranian cyber-attack conspiracy against the U.S.

Venezuelan electoral officials subsequently announced that any expats registered to vote in Miami could now do so only by reporting to the nearest consulate in operation Sunday: the one in New Orleans, more than 860 miles away.

Atlanta husband-and-wife Alberto Adrianza, 37, and Vincenzina Adrianza, 35, illustrate the trouble Venezuelan expats went through to exercise their right to vote. They left their home with their two daughters, ages 4 and 7, at 2 a.m. Saturday. They arrived in New Orleans 16 hours later so only Vincenzina Adrianza could cast a ballot Sunday.

Alberto Adrianza couldn't vote due to complications with his registration, but he said of the trip, "It's worth it. One vote makes the difference." Adrianza was alluding to some surveys prior to election day that suggested the race between Chavez and Capriles was neck-and-neck.

Discussing her motivations for traveling to New Orleans with her family, Vincenzina Adrianza added, "My parents and my sister are still in Venezuela. It's the country where I was born. ... I want to see that country do well."

Griffith, who moved to the United States when he was 11, expressed similar sentiments. He paid $175 for his bus ticket to New Orleans. His return trip to Miami was supposed to leave later Sunday and arrive early Monday, just hours before he has to go to work at his hardware store job.

Griffith said he voted for Capriles for the sake of his grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, who remain in Venezuela. Griffith, after voting, wore a Venezuela baseball cap and a sticker declaring, "I voted." Griffith said he would be checking the election returns on the bus on his cell phone and was praying Capriles would emerge the winner.